One of the many important duties of NHRA’s Racing Administration department is the setting of class quotas at NHRA national events. Deciding on the number of entrants per class and in total takes into account many factors that reflect the current environment of the events, including historical data, the size of facility, television broadcast times, track and local curfews, weather history, the size and number of haulers, and past on-site experience. Despite quotas being set, at many events already this year racing has run well into the evening or NHRA officials were forced to reduce the number of qualifying passes to time constraints.

Below are some examples of the challenges:

Facility size: In many situations we are limited on the amount of entries we can accept due to overall size of the facility.  In Gainesville, approximately 20 teams were parked in the spectator lot.

Live TV: With the move to FS1 and 17 live TV shows changes are made to ensure that segments of racing meet time slots set by FOX.

Curfews/weather: Based on a growing population around many of the facilities, curfews have been established, which limits the amount of time that race cars can be run. That challenge is made tougher early and late in the season when cool weather conditions can produce conditions that are not ideal.

Size of haulers: Over the past several years, the size of haulers have grown, which limits the amount of useable space to have additional cars on property.

NHRA strives to deliver the best experience possible to everyone attending a national event, and the ability to do so is challenged when NHRA is forced to park racers in spectator parking, schedules force us to run late into the evening under conditions that are not ideal, which is why the establishment and enforcement of quotas is so important.